30 Minute Cards

In every stack of paper I buy there are always sheets with designs on them that are too large for an A2 sized card.  If at all possible, I'll cut it so that I can fit the design onto a card front since I don't want to waste perfectly good paper.

This version of a 30 minute card was made by doing some "fussy" cutting.   The sentiment was stamped on vellum with gold metallic ink that did not get dry so I dusted it with gold embossing powder and just heat embossed it.

Super simple and I think it turned out really cute!

Bird in a Frame Card

Debbie Henderson, a Stampin' Up demonstrator, designed this card.  She used only SU punches to make the bird and frame.  Although I own the punches she used, I wanted the frame slightly larger so I used my Expression.

Her instructions are to use a 1" square punch, then once you punch that, you center the 1" opening inside the 1 1/4" punch and punch out the frame.  Use the 1 1/2" scalloped square punch for the base.

I used Mini Monograms and adjusted the scalloped square to 1 5/8" in Design Studio.  Using George, I then placed 1 3/8" squares on my mat and centered a 1" square in the center, welded them, and cut out the frames.

The frame is applied with narrow strips of adhesive foam and the wing was pop dotted onto the bird's body.  I made several of these since they're so cute and fast to do.  They'll be great for Operation Write Home.

You and Me Card

Another card inspired by one done by Vicki Bridges from And Bear Makes 3.  I printed the sentiments with my computer.  The stamps are from Hero Arts.

Bee Happy Card

Inspired by Rose Miller.

 I cut 1 1/2" x 3" strips of three colors of polka dotted paper, layered a scalloped edge underneath and then did pen stitching with a gel pen.  The bees are clip art images from Hallmark card making software.  I accented the center oval with some dots of Pearl Pen.

'Maters!

Summertime, summertime, sum, sum, summertime!  Nothing says summer to me like fresh tomatoes from our garden.  They have been getting ripe a few at a time up until this week.  This is what I picked today off six plants. 

The farmer's market had purple hulled peas today.  Right now, there's a big pot of those simmering for our dinner tomorrow night.  I'll fix cornbread and sliced tomatoes to go with them and we'll enjoy a meal much like one my mom would have fixed when I was a kid.  Yummy!

It's so hot here that we can't leave tomatoes on the plants until they're completely ripe.  You have to pick them with just a little bit of green near the stem.  Momma always brought hers in and placed them stem side down on the window sill to finish getting ripe.  I have no clue why she turned them over, but I do the same thing!

Fred picked up some bacon this morning at the grocery store and I can see BLT's in our near future!

Lots of Layers Cards

These were so much fun to do!  You would not believe how long it took me to pick out sheets of paper that went together!  But, I'm happy with the way they turned out.  This is quite a stretch for me.  Things don't match and "gasp!" the mats for the sentiments aren't symmetrical!  LOL!

Again, thanks to Vicki Bridges for the inspiration to make these.

The stamps are by Impression Obsession, the papers are from Fancy Pants Designs.  Shirley, aka Okieladybug, found them online, ordered several packs and we shared the sheets.  The colors are a little brighter than they appear in the photos.

Handkerchief Baby Bonnet

This is a gift that I enjoy making for baby showers.  Whenever I'm invited to a wedding, I take an antique handkerchief for the bride to carry.  After the ceremony, she gives it back to me and I seal it up in an envelope with her name and the date of the wedding on the front.

When she has a baby, I take the handkerchief and, with a few basting stitches, add some lace and a couple of ribbons for ties and give it to her at her baby shower.  This is the poem that goes with the bonnet.

THE MAGIC HANKY             

I’m just a little handkerchief,
Quite square as you can see,
But with a stitch or two, Linda made
A bonnet out of me.

I’ll be worn home from the hospital, or
On the christening day;
Then neatly pressed and folded
I’ll be carefully packed away.

On her wedding day a bride must have
Traditionally, something old
Good luck, good health, and happiness
It brings her, so it’s told.

Then what could be more pleasant
Than to unpack little me,
To snip a stitch or two and find
Her handkerchief I’ll be.

And if I’m first worn by a boy,
He’ll surely someday wed;
Then he can give his lovely bride
The hanky once worn on his head.  

These are fairly simple to make.  I just fold the hanky in half and then I baste the lace trim on the folded edge.  Measure off two pieces of ribbon long enough for the ties and tack them onto the corners of the folded edge.  Then, using a large basting stitch, gather the opposite side of the hanky and pull tight to gather.
The hankies I like best for this are ones that have some type of embroidery on them.  It adds a lot to the appearance of the bonnet. 

This is the card I made to go with the bonnet.

Cardz to Go! Kit

I've posted before about a stamp store in Moore, OK named And Bear Makes 3.  The artist that teaches there designs card kits.  All the materials, detailed instructions and photographs of the finished cards are packed into a gift bag.  If stamps are used on the cards, you get those also.  The price of the kits is very reasonable so when I see a new one that I like, I pick one up while in the shop or call and they just mail it to me.  The owner is also super nice about ordering stamps for me via the phone and mailing them.  You know, when you don't have any type of craft shop nearby, online and phone shopping gets used a lot!

Vicki Bridges is the artist;  she has a Facebook page called Mizbizibee's Little Bees where she posts her class information and previews the card kits.

These cards are from her Old Shoes Kit.  The kit makes six A6 cards.  The only supplies not in the kit are adhesive, markers and inks.  I used Promarkers to color the boots and hat, Colorbox ink for the edges, and Memento ink to distress the background.

The vintage look is what I'm enjoying doing most these days.  Gotta love Graphic 45 papers!  

Vellum Overlay Cards

Vicki Bridges, who teaches at And Bear Makes 3, designed these cards for one of her classes.  The stamps are Scripty Stems by Stampendous.  The papers I used are Coredinations and Stampin' Up with a vellum overlay.  Some of the cards have dots done with Pearl Pens for accents.  I used Rose Red Momento ink and Chestnut Brown Colorbox Chalk inks.

Designed by Vicki Bridges

Designed by Vicki Bridges

The stamp set has several different script sentiments so I'm going to get a lot of use from this set.

Tightwad Tip--Heart Punch Butterfly

This may be old news to most of you, but I just saw this online.  I use a lot of butterflies on my cards and am always on the lookout for a new shaped punch or stamp set.  This tip will give me a way to have some tiny butterflies as well as a large butterfly shape by using Stampin' Up heart punches.

Just fold your paper and slide the punch over the fold.  Adjust where the punch sits to have larger or smaller wings.

Use a line of Stickles or Pearl Pen, some pearl dots or maybe some baker's twine  to make the body and curl a piece of wire to make the antenna.  How cute would that be?

Birthday Cat Card

This is my interpretation of a challenge from Mizbizeebee's Little Bees today.  I stamped and colored the cat using Promarkers.

Nicest Thoughts Card

I read this quote in a Cards Magazine and sort of adapted the layout from another card to use it.

The flowers were stamped with Memento Rhubarb Stalk ink onto some Stampin Up Pretty in Pink and Coredinations pink cardstock.  I cut them out by hand.

The leaves were done with a Martha Stewart punch.

The solid green background is also Coredinations and the green butterfly print is from a K & Co. paper pad.

The tiny frame is from the French Manor cartridge.

I added some dots of Pearl Pen and was finished!

Little Girl Card

This image is a Studio G stamp.  I colored it with Promarkers and printed the sentiment on my computer.
Another easy card!

Rock Star Card

Original design by Carolyn King.

The color combination came from one suggested on Design Seeds.  If you ever get stuck and need some help in selecting colors that coordinate, there are multiple suggestions on this site.

Original design by Carolyn King

I trimmed off 1/2" from the cover of the card and then adhered a 1/2" strip of paper onto the inside edge.
The stars and circle were cut using the George cartridge.  The dark brown scalloped piece was done with a border punch.  Then I stamped the sentiment and added some Stickles for bling.

Smiles and Laughter Card

This is Echo Park's Hello Spring Butterfly paper.  I found it at the LSS in Enid on my shopping trip last Friday.  It was in the clearance box and I bought the only two sheets left.  Butterflies are my favorite things to use on cards and I wish they'd had more of this paper!

Baker's Twine Card

This card was designed by Katie Gehring and seen on Pinterest.  Just rows of baker's twine and a simple printed sentiment.

Using Kallio Kalleidoscope Papers

This is one of the 8 x 8 papers that Kallio Kalleidoscope sent for me to try out.  I wanted to see if it was heavy weight enough paper to emboss without the image on the surface being torn.  I've embossed other single sided papers and had the white show through from the back.

I'm pleased to say that her paper embossed cleanly and no white showed through at all.  The one I chose has a softened image of daisies in the background so I just cut some daisies from Graphically Speaking and popped them onto an embossed band of yellow paper.

Vintage Cards

I think I've found a new love, Ranger printed tissue paper!  These are my version of the cards designed by Vicki Bridges at And Bear Makes 3.  Since I knew that I wouldn't be able to attend her class, I ordered the class kit and stamps to use at home.

She puts together great kits for her classes and gives you an instruction sheet with photos to use as a guide.  You also get extra embellishments to further personalize your cards.

I'm really pleased with the way these turned out!

Busy Birthday!

Today's my birthday.  I treated myself to the entire day just out shopping and taking a short road trip.

The day started out really great since there were two super nice surprises for me in the mailbox this morning.  Kallio Kalleidoscopes sent me a box of her beautiful 8 x 8 papers and I'll be turning them into some wonderful cards in the next few days.  I'll post photos on here so you can see her designs; they're really very pretty and I think they're going to work back nicely with the stamps and card kit that arrived today too!

And Bear Makes 3 is a stamp shop about 50 miles from my house.  They send out emails with class info every couple of weeks.  If I see something that intrigues me and know that I can't make the class, I just call and they send me the class kit.  Here's the photo of the class samples:

Designed by Vicki Bridges at And Bear Makes 3

It's going to be fun playing with the Kaiser Craft Vintage stamps on the muted paper from Kallio and I'm pretty sure there's going to be some Tim Holtz inks involved too!

I was tempted to just turn around, go back inside and play with the new papers and stamps and forget about the road trip, but, I had a destination in mind so I went on.

My first stop of the day was at a restaurant named POPS. 
It's located on Historic Route 66 just outside Arcadia, OK.  It's become a real tourist attraction because of it's unique architecture and the huge neon pop bottle out front.

The restaurant is a really modern looking building and their claim to fame is that they sell hundreds and hundreds of different types of pop!  You can find any flavor you can think of in their coolers.  The outer walls of the building are glass with shelves full of bottles on display. 

I had one of the best chicken quesadillas that I've ever eaten for lunch---and I didn't even have a pop to go with it!

After lunch I drove on to Historic Guthrie and toured the downtown area and some of the residential streets admiring the Victorian style homes.  Then, I headed to my real destination, Enid, where we lived right after we got married.  It took me a while, and a few wrong turns, to find the houses we'd lived in.  It was nice to see how they'd changed and how much smaller they look than I remember.

My friend, Carrie, had told me there was a scrapbook store on the downtown square so I stopped in and picked up some really pretty Echo Park paper while I was in town.

Enid has changed so much since I lived there!  They now have a Hobby Lobby.  I would have died and gone to heaven if it had been there in the 70's!  I stopped by just to look around and stumbled across a Pagoda cartridge that was marked down to $15.11 and snagged it.  I've looked at the cartridge before but never wanted to spend $25-35 on it.  There are only a few cuts that I really like on this one.

Then I headed back home.  It's about 150 miles to Enid so I'd done enough driving for today.  Rather than take the Interstate highway, which was under construction on the south bound lanes, I decided to jig-jog across on the two lanes instead.  It was a fun trip seeing the small towns and countryside, right up until I missed a turn and wound up going about 30 miles out of the way before I realized what I'd done!

It's been a long, fun day.  Now, I believe I will go put up my feet and relax!   

Pocket Get Well Card

The original  card was done by Carolyn Wolff and seen on Pinterest.

The pocket is from Freshly Picked cartridge, faux stitched with a white Signo pen.  I used a scalloped border punch for the white trim and a Martha Stewart punch for the leaves.  I printed the sentiment, punched it out and added some white doodledots to the red oval.

After applying the pocket to the first one I made, I learned that you need to tuck the tissue behind the pocket before you attach it to the card front!  Most good things I know I've learned the hard way!

Smiling Sun Card

The sun  is from Graphically Speaking cartridge.  I drew on the smiley face and added some foam sun glasses left over from making some cards for children a couple of summers ago.  The sentiments are stamped.

Tightwad Tip

When I saw this tip online a few years ago, it was a real "ah-ha!" moment for me!  I tie lousy bows and wasted so much ribbon trying to get a bow placed where I wanted on a card front until I saw this tip.

First, just cut a length of ribbon longer than the width of the area you want to apply it onto.  You'll need the extra length to make the knot and have enough left over to wrap to the back of the cardstock to secure the ends. Also cut  a short piece--this will become the "bow".

Make a loop in the longer piece about where you
want the bow to be.

Put the short piece of ribbon through the loop.  I cut one from a different color ribbon so you could see it easier.

Tighten the loop and "voila!" you have a bow.

Here's one on the birthday card I made today. 

The sentiment is computer generated; the candles are 5/8" strips I cut by hand; the flame was cut using Splish Splash cartridge and inked.

The First Cucumber of The Season

Today I picked the first cucumber of the season from my small garden out back.  I've been watching it for over two weeks just waiting for it to be big enough.  Guess the rain we had a couple of days ago was just what it needed!

I brought it inside and was anxious to get it peeled and chopped to make one of my favorite cucumber salads.  It's a recipe I got years ago from my good friend, Ella.  I always have the ingredients to make it on hand so I make it a lot during the summer months.

There are no specific amounts, it's one of those recipes you just have to "eye ball".

CUCUMBER SALAD

peeled and diced cucumber

finely diced onion
Miracle Whip salad dressing
lemon juice or vinegar
milk

Combine the lemon juice or vinegar with milk to sour the milk, whisk in 2-3 heaping tablespoons of Miracle Whip until combined.  Taste the mixture and  if it's too acidic for you, just adjust the Miracle Whip amount or add a little white sugar.  Add the cucumber and onion and chill.

For the one large cucumber I had today, I probably used 3/4 cup of milk and 2-3 tablespoons of lemon juice then whisked in 3 heaping tablespoons of Miracle Whip.  The dressing for the salad is really liquid.

It's that easy.  It's okay to enjoy it immediately (I just ate a small bowl of it!) but it's better if you let it stand for a while in the refrigerator.  It will keep several days.

We went to Ella's house one evening for a cookout and she fixed this.  It's a wonderful alternative to just diced cucumbers and onions in vinegar. 

Three Butterflies Card

Another quick and simple card inspired by one seen on Pinterest.  Unfortunately, I can't give credit to the designer since I was never able to find the original post from which the photo was taken.

I used Memento Rich Cocoa to stamp the smaller butterflies and Color Box Prussian Blue to stamp the larger butterfly.  Then I stamped the larger one again and cut it out and pop dotted it on top for some dimension.

The scalloped border was done with a Stampin' Up border punch and the background paper was inked with Tim Holtz Vintage Photo distress ink.